Posted on 12/31/2019 4:12:08 AM PST by Kaslin
A very good read. Thank you for posting.
The population back in the 1920s was just 106 million - and all legal! An interesting fact I discovered: only 1% of the population owned any stock at the time of the 1929 crash.
Surprised to learn that in the 1920s, immigration quotas did not apply to Mexicans (or Canadians) who were allowed to cross the borders freely to work.
So yeah, pretty much everyone here was here legally.
Indoor plumbing, hot running water, ice for refrigeration were scarce. Electricity, like internal combustion cars and trucks were newfangled inventions. Phones were crank and ask the operator to connect; passenger planes were rare and only for the wealthy. Computers were something in science fiction had there been such a genre. Man landing on the moon nearly impossible to imagine. Weather was what happened when you looked outside; tornadoes, northeasters, hurricanes were things that happened not predicted. and so on.
Men all wore hats and overcoats. My grandfather raised 9 kids and made $45 a week. No medical insurance when he broke both his legs and couldn’t work. The kids did.
My grandfather was 25 in 1920. As he got older his short term memory was gone, but his memories of his younger days was sharp as ever. He told me about life on a farm and how their days went then.
Weather was better understood that we might think.
There is a great book called “Isaac’s Storm” that recounts the 1900 Galveston TX hurricane that was one of the most powerful and deadly storms to hit the US in recorded history.
Isaac was a meteorologist that had just stepped into the role after the previous scandal-plagued guy got tossed out. He realized that the storm was coming but couldn’t convince anyone else what was about to happen.
Great Book, also a good Documentary. The story about the orphange left me in tears.
The 1920’s were a really wild time. My grandmother used to tell me stories. I think she had personally been to every speakeasy within 100 miles of Pittsburgh.
“Isaac was a meteorologist that had just stepped into the role after the previous scandal-plagued guy got tossed out. He realized that the storm was coming but couldn’t convince anyone else what was about to happen.”
Thanks for the details, I was about the post the same regarding Galveston. Back then you looked at the clues you could (cloud type, movement, speed, water temps, wave types, etc.). He had nailed it...but it was tourist season. Who knows, there may be stuff we still could learn from him.
100 years ago we also treated diabetics* with the Ketogenic Diet. Why? Because it worked, or at least worked better than any other available option.
Funny thing is that it’s still the case, but shortly after 1920 Insulin was isolated and there were big bucks to make with it...so out with the old, in with the new!
(the above sarcasm refers to Type 2 Diabetes; Type 1 requires Insulin...to stay alive, it was a lifesaver for them)
Weather was not predictable except in the most general sense - there was naught but ships at sea and weather balloons to get readings beyond what earth-bound instruments could discover. Predictions were more like prophesy and disregarded by most like you said.
Bm
We've a year to get ready to observe the turning of a decade, which will happen at midnight 12/31/2020.
I went through that with the beginning of the 21st century. There was no year zero, so by convention in 1900 no one looked at that as the start of the 20th century. That was considered to begin in 1901. But that all went by the wayside ten years ago. Starting tomorrow everyone will refer to the new decade just begun.
Me, too also...And was met with quizzical or blank faced stares...
We all count 1-10, not 0-9...Unless we’re talking about a media ignoramus (apologies for redundancy)…
In which case, for the ignoramus all that matters is being first to say or write something demonstrably stupid...Truth is irrelevant next to popular “culture” groupthink...
tensions are about the same imho. It's just that the media advertises it for the sake of profit and takes sides.
The masses understood weather better back then. Today, people can go a week without setting foot outside or looking out the window. They rely on the Weather Channel to tell them if they need an umbrella that day.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to predict weather events. Little ol’ me knows when there’s a storm or flood coming just by paying attention and watching the skies. Too bad the authorities can’t and do nothing but pull lint from their navels instead of sending out alerts and regulating the river a week prior to massive flooding. Like duuuuuuh, if up stream is flooding then what do think down stream will be like in a few days, huh?
Red sky at night, sailors’delight.
Red sky in the morning, sailors’ take warning.
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